by Hamel, B. B.
“Listen,” Brooks said. “I made a little stop earlier today.”
“Oh yeah? Between all your killings?”
He laughed. “Only killed one guy today. The others were more cooperative.”
“That’s nice, honey.”
He grinned at me. “Cut it out. I want to ask you something.”
“Yes, dear?”
He rolled his eyes. “Look.” I watched as he took a little box from his pocket, and my heart started to race. “We keep saying we’re going to do this one day, but I’m sick of putting it off. Marry me, Emma.”
“Of course,” I whispered.
He opened the box and showed me a beautiful, enormous diamond ring.
“Brooks!” I gasped. “How could you afford this?”
“Don’t worry about it.” He took it out of the box and slipped it on my finger, a perfect fit. “You like it?”
“I love it.” I kissed him hard, my heart hammering.
I couldn’t believe this had happened to me. Only a year ago, I was living a horrible life, afraid every day of my father. Now I was engaged to the love of my life, the strongest and most honorable man I’d ever met. I did work I really believed in, important work. I helped save lives.
Not to mention the child I had growing inside me.
And I lived in a gorgeous penthouse. Nothing could have worked out better.
There were still problems, of course. The mafia was getting more aggressive in trying to fight us, and their war with the Russians was slowing down. The Russians were also starting to come after us, and so more and more of our people were getting caught.
But the risks were all worth it. Brooks wrapped me in his arms and held me tight, and I felt safe. I knew I was safe. Brooks would keep us alive, keep us safe. We had a family on the way.
“We’ll do this right,” he said. “Big wedding. Invite everyone in the city.”
I laughed. “How about we just go down to the courthouse and make it real?”
“That can work too.” He grinned and kissed me.
That was all I needed, just Brooks and a judge and a pen to sign the papers with. Brooks was my truth, my honor, my purpose. This family and this life, it was all I could ever need, more than I could ever ask for.
My beautiful apartment, my beautiful husband. I didn’t know how I’d gotten here, but I couldn’t imagine being anywhere else. I trusted him with everything I had, and he trusted me.
Trust and love. That was going to be enough, more than enough, just perfectly enough.
THANK YOU!
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Keep reading for the full text of STIFF: A Stepbrother Romance!
Love badass alpha mobsters? Try Bastard’s Baby, another exciting installment in the Barone Crime Family series!
I had that bastard’s baby and now I need his help.
Vince Mori is my enemy. He’s an infamous Italian mobster, all ripped muscles and dangerous tattoos. He’s a cocky a**hole, and for just one night that was exactly what I was looking for. He was a wild ride, a way to rebel against my strict family.
And he doesn’t know that he’s the father of my baby.
I’m the daughter of one of the most feared Russian mob bosses in the city. When I give birth to my baby boy Alexei, my father wants to tear my child away from me.
I won’t let that happen. They may be my family, but I’ll do whatever it takes to keep my baby.
The Russians are at war with the Italians, but I know Vince is my only chance. When I run away from home and ask him for help, I’m risking my life to save my son.
Vince is everything I’m supposed to hate, but secretly can’t get enough of. He’s only interested in teasing me mercilessly with his dirty mouth and frustrating grin.
Now I’m trapped in the Italian mob’s mansion, living next door to my baby’s father. I need their protection, but the war is escalating faster every day.
If the cocky jerk Vince Mori can’t learn what it means to be a father, I might be totally screwed.
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In the mood for a dirty bad boy SEAL?
That bastard got me pregnant and then he disappeared.
Handsome, ripped, and dangerous. If only I’d known that the delicious stranger was a Navy SEAL on a mission. For just one night, Emory Rush seduced me on the dance floor, carried me to his bed, and made me feel things I never could have imagined.
Then he vanished, leaving me alone and pregnant. If it weren’t for my son Mason I would think it was all a dream. A fantasy, that a man like Emory could make me feel so good.
When he shows up on my doorstep months later to warn me that my life is in danger, I can’t believe him. But soon it all becomes clear: Emory’s been hunting a group of international terrorists, and now those enemies know that Mason and I exist.
We’re in danger, and the only man that can protect us is the same bastard that left me shattered.
With a terrorist plot threatening the country and the future of our family at stake, we have to learn to trust each other or else lose everything.
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Need even more bad boy SEALs?
My stepbrother is raging hard and he won’t be controlled.
When we first met, he was only a perfectly gorgeous stranger all covered in tattoos.
I couldn’t resist pressing my body close against his. I couldn’t say no when he took me out to the alley to do more than just dance.
How could I have known my overbearing Dad just married his crazy-as-hell Mom?
His name is Nathan Magnus and he’s a total prick. He’s a Navy SEAL, trained to fight and kill in a thousand different ways, and he thinks he’s the best thing to ever happen to me.
He’s everything I hate wrapped in everything I want.
Now he’s staying at our house all summer.
And that’s not even the worst part.
Someone is after me because of my father’s shady business deals, and only Nathan is strong enough to keep everyone safe.
He has no sense of boundaries. He’s my bodyguard, but that doesn’t mean he can strip down and take a shower right in front of me.
And of course I can’t help but stare. He’s delicious, provocative, dirty, and arrogant.
I may be safe with my stepSEAL around, but I don’t stand a chance.
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Stiff: A Stepbrother Romance
Prologue
I was stuck in the dark.
He was so far away and his touch was like a distant memory. I could just barely feel the soft slip of his lips against my skin. I wanted that feeling again, needed it badly, but I couldn’t reach him. I wanted his muscles, his skin, his lips, his leg-shaking grin. He made me squirm with sweet agony. He was the light, the opposite of where I was.
The darker one was just down the hall.
I could hear the water drip down the walls of my cage, my body contorted to fit comfortably while my hands were locked up ab
ove my head.
He hadn’t touched me. Not yet, at least.
But his whispered words were almost worst: I’m going to kill him slowly, and I’m going to make you watch.
He was always just a shadow, just a small motion in the corner of my eyes. I never thought I’d be taken, never thought I’d be held somewhere against my will.
I also never thought I’d be begging for my life in the den of a serial killer.
Still, Easton was out there. It was him that I needed, his strength that kept me from screaming out. I remembered the way his arms grabbed me against his body, the way his tattoos snaked in and out of his sleeves, and that wicked, teasing grin.
I thought of him over and over, locked in that cage.
I’m going to cut his throat for you, Laney. I’m going to make you watch.
Shivers ran down my spine.
Open your mouth, Laney. Scream for me.
Quiet as a mouse.
Still as the dead.
I wouldn’t give him what he wanted.
1
Laney
I hadn’t been home in almost three years.
Once I got out of Mishawaka, I thought I was gone for good. I never wanted to go back to my small, backwoods town in the middle of Indiana.
But, unfortunately, it was hard not to come home when your dad just got married without telling you about it.
Mishawaka. Town of a few thousand people, and a few thousand more lies. It was every single small-town stereotype all rolled into one very real place. I loved it back when I was a little kid. My mom was alive back then, and Mishawaka felt like a real home. Things changed after she passed away and I began to realize that small-town life wasn’t what I thought it was.
College was my way out. When I got my scholarship to study criminal justice at the University of Chicago, my whole world changed. Suddenly it wasn’t just the same three places and the same old people, but it was an entire city. I was both surrounded and alone, and it was totally amazing. Nobody knew me and I knew nobody, and I liked it like that.
Of course, I made friends. College was just like that. You had to really hate people if you wanted to make absolutely no friends. I fell into a comfortable life in the city, working a decent job during summers to afford my apartment and going to school.
Up until I got the call, at least.
Summer had just started and the city was coming alive after a particularly brutal winter. It was early and I had just finished my finals. I was looking forward to finally taking it easy and not working while going to classes every single day.
But that was a pipe dream, of course.
My cell phone rang, but I didn’t recognize the number. I considered not answering, and in retrospect I wish I hadn’t. That one phone call would lead to everything, to working side by side with the most frustrating man I’d ever met, to helping people in ways I never realized I could, to getting locked in a cage.
But that wasn’t for another few weeks.
“Hello?” I said, picking up the phone.
“Sweetie, it’s Dad.”
I paused, surprised. I hadn’t heard from him in a few months. “How’s it going, Dad?”
“I’m fine.” There was another awkward pause. Why had things gotten so strained between the two of us?
I knew the answer to that question. I moved away from Mishawaka and never looked back, and in a lot of ways Dad felt like that was like turning my back on our family. He had lived in town his whole life and so had my mom, and he never really understood me moving all the way to the city to get away from town.
I should have kept in better touch with him, even went home a few times to visit, but it was so easy for time to get away from you. One day I hadn’t been home once during freshman year, and the next day it’d been three years, all in the blink of an eye.
“I have to tell you something, kiddo,” he said.
“Okay. What happened?” I felt nervous, like I had somehow done something wrong.
“I got married.”
My eyes went wide and I took a short breath. “Are you serious?” I asked.
“Yes, dear, very serious. Do you remember Mrs. Wright?”
“Sure, I remember her.” She was blond, tall, and infamous. Her husband had died years before I was born, but she’d kept his name. She was a popular lawyer in town and sat on the council, the only woman with a recurring seat. In a lot of ways, Susan Wright was the most powerful woman in town.
“Well,” Dad continued, “her and I have been getting very close over the past couple of years. Last weekend, we decided to finally make it official.”
I shook my head. “This is pretty hard to believe.”
“Listen, sweetie, I know we haven’t seen much of each other lately, but I’d love it if you could come home and spend some time with us this summer.”
I bit my lip. “I don’t know, Dad.”
“Please? It’d mean a lot to both of us.”
“I have a lot of work to do here. I have a job. I can’t just leave, you know?”
“Actually, about jobs,” Dad said quickly. “Susan heard you were a criminal justice major, and she pulled some strings. If you want, there’s an important internship with a detective that would be perfect for you.”
“An internship with a detective?”
“Sure. It’s part of a new program at the sheriff’s.”
I was completely blown away and speechless. I had barely spoken to my dad in the last three years, and suddenly he was dropping bombshells on me one after the other.
“Let’s slow down,” I said.
“Hold on, honey,” he replied. I heard some sounds on the other end of the line. “I’m sorry. I have to run. I’m at a job site right now.”
I sighed. “Okay, sure.” Dad was one of the most famous and influential property developers in our area, and he was pretty much always working.
“Please think about it.”
“Okay. I will.”
“Good to hear from you.” He hung up the phone.
I leaned back in my chair, tossing my phone onto the couch. I barely understood what I was feeling as I took a few deep breaths.
My dad had remarried. He hadn’t even told me about his relationship before that point. Not that I could blame him; I was pretty much estranged from him. But suddenly he wanted me home and had even found a job for me?
I sighed, looking out the window. It had been a long time since I was home. Things had to have changed. At least, I had certainly changed. There were friends back home that I hadn’t seen in a while.
Plus, if Susan Wright had gotten me a job, it was probably pretty serious. I was working as a waitress at a local upscale bar, and while the money was good, it wasn’t exactly helping my career at all.
My long-time goal was to go into the FBI. I didn’t necessarily want to be a field agent, but instead I wanted to work as an analyst or something like that. Ideally, I’d work as support for agents, providing intelligent analysis on field reports and cases, essentially acting as an extra brain for stuck agents.
Unfortunately, splitting the bill thirty ways on thirty different credit cards for drunk assholes didn’t exactly give me the skills I needed.
It was a tough decision. I had left Mishawaka for a lot of reasons, and I wasn’t sure I was ready to go back. Then again, I had changed. That town didn’t have control over me anymore.
It was a tough decision either way.
I stood up and stretched. I decided that there was only one way to figure things out: I needed to order a pizza.
Two weeks later, I climbed out of the cab and looked up at my Dad’s house.
I paid and tipped the cabbie and watched as he drove off, leaving me standing there regretting every decision I had made leading up to that moment.
The pizza hadn’t worked, unfortunately, and I had still been without any clue about what to do when I’d got another call I didn’t recognize.
It was Susan herself, as it turned out.
; And she was very lovely. We had a long chat about her and my father, and she even gave me more details about the internship. Apparently, it was with a private detective that used to be a prominent FBI member, which seemed pretty much too good to be true.
After that conversation, and after another frustrating shift at the bar, I pretty much made up my mind. I gave my notice the next day, and I was headed home not too long after that.
It was a crazy decision. My friends all thought I was nuts for just up and going home for the summer, and especially for giving up my job.
But as soon as I heard that I would be working with an FBI agent, even if he had left the bureau, I knew I had to go. I knew I couldn’t turn down an opportunity like that.
Plus, I wanted to see my dad, of course. I felt bad that the job was what really changed my mind, but I couldn’t deny it. I planned on making it up to Dad by spending plenty of time with him, or at least as much as he wanted.
I took another steadying breath and trudged up the stairs, ringing the doorbell. It felt weird to be ringing my dad’s bell, but it wasn’t the same house I had grown up in. So much had changed, and yet nothing ever really does.
I waited a few minutes before ringing again. Eventually, I heard someone yell from inside, and slowly the door pushed open.